Leslie Palma

June 12, 2014

Priests for Life-Staten Island, NY

NEW ORLEANS -- Father Frank Pavone, National Director of Priests for Life, issued the following statement today regarding a decision in the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals that sided with the Obama administration on the HHS mandate.

"The Sixth Circuit decision today misrepresents the moral problem that Catholic groups have with the HHS
mandate. As we have asserted in our own Priests for Life case in the D.C. circuit Court of Appeals, it is not the activity of another person that makes our signing of the accommodation an act of illicit cooperation. Rather, it is precisely the action that the government is asking us to perform that is the problem. In the government's scheme, we, the employers, remain the gateway to our employees' coverage for immoral activities. If the government wants to expand access to abortion and contraception, it's going to have to do so without us, period, Amen."